


The Evil Horde's Daddy-Daughter Work Day

by Hemogobbler



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Bonding, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Cybernetics, Dubious Morality, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Families of Choice, Gen, Imp and Emily have fun together!, Office Party, Or???, Science Nerds, hardass dad Hordak, overly-keen student Entrapta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-15 16:43:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18673537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hemogobbler/pseuds/Hemogobbler
Summary: Entrapta helps get Hordak's portal back online, and they are no longer alone in the universe. Unfortunately for Hordak, it falls on the day of homeworld's most cherished and lethally-enforced family gathering: Daddy-Daughter Work Day.Consuming Etheria and escaping Despondos are put on hold as the Horde High Commission and their 'children' arrive to touch base with Hordak. With no other friends, Hordak entrusts Entrapta with the role of co-host and daughter for the day. It gets weird.





	The Evil Horde's Daddy-Daughter Work Day

Entrapta tapped a pen against her chin.

 

“ _Question 1:_ should I call you ‘daddy’?”

 

Hordak shot Entrapta a furious response with blood-red eyes, but they were ineffective against her welding mask and general disregard for her own safety. His eyes faded back to yellow.

 

“You will do no such thing. Hordak will suffice.”  

 

Entrapta noted down his answer on a notepad since she was not allowed to take audio from here, and because the imp had stolen her recorder. She circled ‘Hordak.’

 

Imp stalked the corners of the sanctum, crawling underneath impromptu tables taken from the cadets’ cafeteria that had been hastily decorated with information and ominous tech prototypes. He sulked alone and played back the word ‘daddy’ quietly to himself, longing for the same fondness that his own master showed Entrapta. Emily had a black tie drawn on her and followed a designated patrol route, a large plate of tiny food balanced on her head.

 

A probe from Hordak’s reconstructor jabbed into his body, sending a spark through his ribs as it failed to attach his armor. He growled through grit teeth and crushed the metallic appendage. His hand shook with pain, the holes in his wishbone arms aching as he watched the shrapnel fall through.

 

Entrapta caught some pieces with a lock of purple hair and pried them apart like pistachios to get to their juicy circuitry. She pocketed still-sparking wires for later and waved Emily over.

 

“Allow Emily!” Entrapta said excitedly. Emily approached Hordak and a pinpoint laser finger sprang from her. It was a precise, fiery nail. “Don’t worry, she’s very gentle!”

 

Hordak looked down on his war-bot and nodded, letting Emily laser the parts of Hordak’s body that weren’t flesh. It stung as much as when Hordak had to brush his teeth, but Emily was done in seconds.

 

Emily lightly toasted the metallic holes embedded in his cyborg body. She interfaced with his outfitter and guided the armor onto him, latching the joints into the holes, and sealed it tight. Hordak felt familiar strength return. He patted the bot his praise and Emily beeped.

 

A banner made by Scorpia hung across the space of the sanctum and read:

 

‘The Evil Horde’s daddy-daughter work day!’

 

Scorpia had drawn a cute tiny Entrapta and a big scary Hordak on it. The stick figures were smiling and captioned: ‘we’re better together!’ They happily used screwdrivers on a mechanical version of the Horde’s insignia, some spooky red wings. Hordak said he would allow it because it was, “better than nothing,” but Entrapta was pretty sure there had been a tear in his eye.

 

Entrapta finished off modifications to the gateway that would welcome the Horde High Commission. According to Hordak, they were a selection of supreme Horde officials “grown fat and pitiful from undeserved victories on planets of ash.” The first contact Hordak had with homeworld in decades, and it was a communication from Horde Prime telling him to prepare for ‘daddy-daughter day.’ He had stared at the message in silent agony until Entrapta told him the portal on the other side was coming online and requesting transference rights.

 

“ _Question 2:_ in your opinion, this event more closely relates to which of the following:

 

  * A) A science fair?  



 

  * B) A company holiday?



 

  * C) A top-secret R&D meeting?



 

I know it’s a social experiment, but I - I can’t pin down the function unless it’s  _all of them_   _at once_  which means variables are - ”

 

Hordak stopped her short with a hand. She was learning to listen when he did since, apparently, he had a habit of dramatically cutting off the oxygen in the room to make a point. She had yet to encounter such treatment.

 

“Now that we are no longer stranded in Despondos...” Hordak almost smiled. “We are subject to the whims of an all-too bureaucratic leadership. One that demands we follow ancient, foolish traditions of blending scientific advancement and…. family.”

 

“And so I, as your lab assistant, am tasked with the role of your adopted daughter so that we can…?” Entrapta dragged out the last vowel, hypothesizing on the spot.

 

“Show them how far we’ve come. What they have missed in my absence. Announce my return. Once this ridiculous charade is through, Prime will receive word of Etheria in my hands, ready for harvest. This backwater planet is crude but full of power. I will consume it and spit it back in their faces. Then, they will remember me.”

 

“Right, consume,” Entrapta took down his words. “ _Question 3:_ can I invite Catra and Scorpia? Scorpia made the sign and Catra will go  _crazy_ for the fishcakes.”

 

“Absolutely not. I was merciful when you informed me that Scorpia knew of this event. She remains loyal and is a gifted artist. Catra is being dealt with separately. You are to repeat nothing of this ruse to anyone. I grant you this trust because you are talented, Entrapta, and I reward talent.”

 

Entrapta nodded and stood tall on her thick tendrils of hair, beaming eye-level at Hordak. He admired her lack of fear. She was devout of purpose and, unlike most of his cronies, didn’t lie to him. She had great potential. He gave her a nod and ordered her to turn on the portal.

 

“You may even learn something from these old soldiers, and earn your freedom from this doomed world.”

 

* * *

 

Hordak’s sanctum was soon filled with a dozen Horde homeworld commanders and their weird daughters. The meetup was in full swing: they pondered holographic demonstrations of the destruction of galaxies and the ones who still had biological stomachs took great delight in the cupcakes.

 

The fathers were similar to Hordak in that they all seemed to have been left in a microwave for too long. Their skin was pale and their faces were haggard from neverending war. Blue veins poked out from the ends of their robes, which mostly consisted of black and red fabrics. Like Hordak, most of them had a bionic limb or two. Unlike Hordak, all of them had cybernetic implants in their heads of some kind.

 

Entrapta suspected most of the ‘daughters’ gathered were also stand-ins and proteges taken in from fallen worlds. One of them was a black cyborg wolf, which broke something inside Entrapta. Her shriek of excitement made everyone in the room jump. She rushed over to the creature, petting and taking hair samples until the wolf spoke and Entrapta started screaming again.

 

“Please don’t do that. It makes me uncomfortable,” A soft, electronic voice came from below a tuft of black fur at the wolf’s neck.

 

Entrapta started to breathe and apologized, begging the wolf to tell her _everything_.

 

~~~

 

“...Couldn’t make it, but of course, the Prime sends their regards.”

 

A big man with dark blue eyes and a metal jaw spoke to Hordak while chomping down on the fishcakes. Hordak sneered at him and his disgusting open mouth.

 

“Are you saying I wasn’t worth his time, Jax? That I wouldn’t have anything to report after a millennium stranded in this forsaken hole?” Hordak clenched his fist.

 

Jax looked around. He saw the banner, the fancy serving robot making another pass and some of Entrapta and Hordak’s most recent breakthroughs in the fields of science and war.

 

“Seems adequate enough, Hordak. Did you miss the luxuries of home? Honestly, you do look like you’re in need of decontamination. It must have been  _so_ difficult for you fighting those terrifying _princesses_.”

 

“You’d do well not to underestimate your opponents, young and sparkly though they may be. I’ve seen 11-year-olds wield power that would rival that of our most starved slaughter-beasts. When was the last time you saw combat?” Hordak asked, and the man laughed.

 

“When was yours? That’s not what we do anymore, Hordak, that’s for them,” He pointed to the daughters who were getting along better. “The glory days are over. We’ve made countless planets turn against themselves; there’s no need for us to be on the front lines anymore. The Horde’s won.”

 

“No,” Hordak grunted. “We haven’t, not here and not yet. I’ve fought for a hundred years with no support from homeworld. My body is falling apart while my strongholds are at constant risk from princesses who tear the earth asunder in their attempts to  _find themselves_ and,  _still,_ I must suffer through this dialogue as if you are anything more to me than a parasite gorging yourself on my army’s food.”

 

Hordak slapped the last fishcake from Jax’s hand and they watched it get caught by the cyberwolf. Entrapta got everyone clapping for her and the wolf turned her nose down in embarrassment. Jax playfully punched Hordak’s arm.

 

“We didn’t miss you either, Hordak.”

 

Hordak swatted the hand away and imagined ripping it from his body.

 

~~~

 

“But what I’m really the proudest of is this!”

 

Entrapta yelled as she pulled off the back panel of the portal generator with nothing but her fingers and showed off its insides. There was a crystal that refracted light encased near the projection points of the machine, where the portal was shot out from. Entrapta explained to a scattering of dads:

 

“With this, you can change the color of your portal and,  _in theory,_ it should show up on the other side too! Feeling ominous? Show up to peace negotiations with a blood-red portal behind you! Make it a hot pink for your date with that special someone, or try moody blue if you’re just having one of those days and you want your pals to give you some space!”

 

The dads nodded and asked if they could sketch her design and if she wanted compensation. She was satisfied with an information exchange from a hulking man who had a cybernetic eye and a ruby-studded eyepatch.

 

“Folks never expect One-Eyed Rhombo’s second eye!” Rhombo explained. “Always thinkin’ I’ve got a blind-side n’ duckin’ to the left. Well, how’s this for a blind-side...!”

 

His eyepatch flipped up and his second cybernetic eye was revealed. They both glowed red and he shot two lasers from his corneas. They severed the welcome banner’s string and singed Imp’s tail as Entrapta clasped her hands together in glee.

 

She dreamed of what other wonders would wait through the many doors that the portal could open, but it soon became too difficult to think about.

 

~~~

 

“So,” Hordak began, speaking to a young, brooding girl with short black hair who was completely free from augmentations and standing alone. She had the same paleness that all the blue-skinned Horde youths soon came to accept as fate. “You’re… a child?”

 

She squinted her dark eyes at him.

 

“You’re… some old dude? What?”

 

“What? I’m making conversation.” He replied, uncertain.

 

“Do it somewhere else,” She said and turned to watch a hologram of Etheria spin.

 

“It seems I’m not wanted by my peers,” Hordak went on. “And you, are you the same? Why do you stand apart from the rest?”

 

“Why are you still talking to me? This is creepy, dude.”

 

“Yes,” Hordak nodded and watched the dads playing Entrapta’s homemade video-games. “I suppose it is. But I do not wish to be here, and I suspect the same is true for you. Tell me why and I’ll leave you alone.”

 

She furrowed her brow.

 

“Everyone knows Etheria’s, like, a stain on the empire. They teach you that at the academy. The only planet we couldn’t settle, and we botched it so hard it straight-up disappeared. Good job, loser.”

 

Hordak was taken aback by this sassy child. He scowled at her and stormed off.

 

~~~

 

Entrapta met Hordak at the table of weaponry. Looking at his accomplishments always made him feel better. He held a stun baton in his hand - a mainstay amongst his troops, and waved it around with a practiced, forceful grip.

 

“Did you know, Entrapta, that I developed this?”

 

He held it close to her and she listened to the spark at the tip crackle.

 

“Non-lethal!” She exclaimed. “Very admirable!”

 

“To go around slaying everyone that crossed my path would have been child’s play. I restrained myself, knowing even then I would need an army for what I would set out to accomplish. As it turns out, if you spare a life, it is yours forever.”

 

Entrapta cocked her head and wrote it down.

 

~~~

 

“ _Beep boop,_ ” Emily remarked to Imp once she had run out of snacks to serve.

 

Imp nodded and sat on the now-empty plate atop her head. He guided her to the best place to play hide-and-seek while their masters talked shop. It was a great way to advance Emily’s AI and Imp was particularly good at it from years of spying.

 

“ _Boop beep,_ ” He repeated in reverse back to her and babbled happily.

 

~~~

 

“MY DAUGHTER IS A GIFT TO THE UNIVERSE AND YOU ARE NOTHING!”

 

After one too many fishcakes, Jax had succeeded in his attempts to rile up Hordak. His jaw was inching closer to dislocation from Hordak’s relentless blows. Standard practice when it came to disagreements on Horde worlds, but this time there was something more than righteous fury delivering Hordak’s knuckles to the metal chin he hated so much.

 

“SHE WILL HERALD AN AGE OF DISCOVERY AND INNOVATION WHILE YOU COWER AND SWEAT BENEATH HER HEEL!”

 

Jax’s daughter, a fully cyberized woman pulsing with red lights that made bloody rivers run through her body, separated the two of them and knocked Hordak flat to the ground with an elbow. The rest of the attendees cheered at the prospect of a good fight, but Entrapta stood by the cybernetic woman and stopped the old men from killing themselves any faster.

 

“Sully her name again, and I promise that your world will feel our strength,” Hordak finished, riding a black wave of adrenaline he thought lost to him. Entrapta stuck her tongue out at the fallen cyborg man and got drinks.

 

~~~

 

“So, you’re a princess?” A dark-skinned girl covered in scars and full combat gear asked.

 

“Technically, yeah. Still waiting on that runestone though! How did you know?” She asked, taking the armor’s measurements like the girl inside was nothing more than a mannequin. She took the tape from Entrapta and threw it aside.

 

“Right here,” She scrolled through Hordak’s files and up came a picture of Entrapta and details of her princess-hood, kingdom, and current status. “What, Hordak take pity on you or something?” She scoffed, “I don’t buy it. You think any of us are here because of pity?”

 

The girl was fierce and spoke with a hostility that suggested she came into the world fighting and would likely go out the same way. She looked timeworn, a betrayed soul, and Entrapta couldn’t believe she was older than her.

 

“Not that I’m counting all my revolutionary breakthroughs or anything, ( _I am_ ), but _I did_ fix the portal. And all those years it took too, oh!” Entrapta held a hand to her brow melodramatically. “If it wasn’t for ol’ poppa Hordak believing in me all that time, well, you guys wouldn’t be here!”

 

The fighter leaned in close, “No chance, princess. Princess means prisoner. You remember that.”

 

Entrapta was pushed back and nearly tripped over her hair as the girl left her anxious over her status. She and Hordak were friends, weren’t they? Catra and Scorpia held her prisoner but now they watched bot-streams together and she didn’t have to stay cuffed to a wall! 

 

 _Hordak is different_ _,_ She thought.

 

Entrapta started to dislike the people around her; they made her feel out of place. She missed Catra and Scorpia, and their hugs. These invaders didn’t hug. Hordak noticed her retreating into a shell and joined her. They stayed together for the rest of the event, killing time tinkering with plasma rifles and watching slo-mo simulations of bots being catapulted at the Queen’s room in Bright Moon.

 

~~~

 

It came to an end with little fanfare. It had been exhausting for everyone involved, but eventually, the congregation decided they had doom to orchestrate and faded away through a dark red portal. The sanctum went quiet once more, the way it was meant to be. Entrapta had a surprised look on her face as she studied the console that directed the gateway’s traffic.

 

“Uh-oh,” Entrapta’s eyebrows skyrocketed.

 

“Uh-oh?” Hordak repeated.

 

“I - I don’t know where that sent them. I don’t know  _IF_ that sent them. I think I bonked the coordinates out of it when I was showing it off to Rhombo’s friends.  _Could be_ they’re just gone forever now?”

 

“UH OH?!” Hordak bellowed, his eyes a deadly crimson. “DID YOU KILL THE HORDE HIGH COMMISSION?”

 

“Boy, I sure hope not! Nothing indicates they’re dead, BUT, they’re not  _here_ and they’re not _there_ , so they’re somewhere in the biiiiig middle zone,” Entrapta stretched her arms and hair as far as they would go. “And when I say biiiiig, I MEAN BIII - ”

 

Hordak’s red teeth bared, and Entrapta heard him breathe for the first time. Machinery in his torso whirred online. He narrowed his eyes at her as something charged his body and his chest began to heave. Entrapta looked neither apologetic nor worried, just curious.

 

It was the first noise escaping from Hordak’s throat that made him feel something.

 

“Hah!”

 

It was a violent, sadistic exhale, but it held emotion. He grinned savagely and began laughing in earnest, loud from long-vacant lungs. Entrapta joined him because she found his evil laugh so contagious. They cackled together, and the combined noise of a genocidal dictator and a mad scientist echoing throughout the sanctum made Horde patrols steer clear of the conjoining corridors more than ever before.

 

“Good!” Hordak said. “Excellent work, Entrapta! Scatter them to the winds like the embers of their careers. Let them see how difficult it is to find your home on a planet that despises you.”

 

He turned to Entrapta, looking powerful and alive.

 

“Entrapta, you have done what I could only dream of in cryostasis. Good riddance.”

 

He clasped Entrapta’s shoulder and genuinely smiled, though his cheeks took no time to fight their way back down.

 

“I’m sure the Prime will be impressed - it was from them that I learned to reward initiative. This was nothing if not ruthless, decisive, initiative."

 

Hordak felt like he could eat a planet. He stretched his neck, savored his appetite, and went on.

 

“Not only has the war has opened up to the universe, but it is free from the instability of weak leadership. History will remember you, Entrapta, I promise you that.”

 

Entrapta wrote down ‘ethical dilemma 64 - not actually a dilemma?’ and tried smiling at him, but couldn’t. Her eyes were shaky and she fidgeted with the pen nervously.

 

She followed through with the thought of the plan that grew closer now that ever before: leeching the First Ones’ technological blood from the planet and moving on to the next. It stung her insides and made her feel sick.

 

She had always understood that their actions would raze the planet, taking a great many homes and lives in the process, but it was no longer theoretical. The scientific advancement from the First One's power that Hordak gained would be miraculous, worth the study of a thousand lifetimes. Such a number of lifetimes may even become possible in the future they were making - but Entrapta could no longer ignore the sacrifice it demanded.

 

“I need to tell my - people, there’s - there are friends, I had once, that don’t want this. Their whole schtick is  _not_ letting this happen. I should tell them, shouldn’t I, because they... still matter to me?” She asked.

 

Hordak eyed her and could not feel hatred. To him, she was still young and learning that life was as long as you willed it to be. She went red like she had remembered grave mistakes made and retreated into her hair, sitting down in a big ball of purple.

 

He regarded her with something shy of empathy; an understanding that severing the attachments we have to our worlds was the hardest thing this life could ask of you.

 

“We need to all go together - ” She continued, muffled, “- tell them we’re not stuck here anymore, even if they don’t care about me, because they should get to see other planets too! The flowers here will die… everything… everything will...”

 

She went silent. Hordak pushed a hand through the center of the hairy mass and found her tear-struck face. She held her knees together and furrowed her brow, hoping for a morally-acceptable conclusion and doubting her ability to ever create one.

 

“That will be their choice, Entrapta. Like it was yours to join me.”

 

Hordak offered his hand. Friends spoke sense to Entrapta when the science or her own brain was overwhelming her. Hordak was the smartest friend she knew. She took his hand and stood up, attaching herself to his ravenous dream.

 

The cost yet lingered in her mind, as did the friends she had made outside the Fright Zone. After a long period of silence, before things had the chance to go back to normal, Entrapta asked Hordak a sobering question.

 

“Like it or not, isn’t this... your home, too?”

 

Hordak raised his fist, saw Entrapta’s uneasy face, and let it fall. Imp watched him attentively.

 

“My home,” Hordak sighed, “Is the war. I know nothing else, and there is nothing else worth knowing.”

 

Entrapta opened her mouth to speak but Hordak raised a hand in warning. The exit from his Sanctum opened, and he pointed towards it. His eyes flickered between red and yellow.

 

“Go to your room, Entrapta.”

**Author's Note:**

> THANK YOU FOR READING!
> 
> <3
> 
> I LOVE THEM AND I WANT MORE!!!
> 
> POST-SEASON 3 UPDATE: I GOT SO MUCH.


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